RMS Queen Mary is a lone survivor, the last of a breed of ships the like of which we are unlikely to see again. She is a reminder of an age of opulence and elegance, and a tangible link to the past. Representative of a bygone age, Queen Mary’s importance is obvious, but there was not a time when the ship was anything but important, even before her launch, as David Ellery explains.
The concept of a liner more than 1,000ft (304.8m) in length was first conceived by Cunard Steamship Company in 1926. At the time, Cunard operated a weekly transatlantic service between Britain and America using three liners: Mauretania (31,938gt, maiden voyage 1907), Aquitania (45,647gt, maiden voyage May 1914) and Berengaria (formerly Imperator of Hamburg-America Line, 52,117gt, launched May…